highlighting the fascinating legal world of gifts, giving, and charity

05/29/2013

Here is an interview with lawyer and author Marlen Suyata Bodden, who wrote the

fictional The Wedding Gift. The book is set in the 1850s American South and tells a story where a slave master gives his daughter a slave as a wedding gift. It just so happens that the slave is also his offspring, and the half-sister of the now married white daughter.

I will delve into chronocentric judgment--but this gift is inappropriate on so many levels.

While this is not a post about the law, it is that time for graduation gifting, and some of the ideas in this report are pretty special. My personal favorities include the gifting stock shares and helping students set up Sharebuilder accounts.

A report in the Guardian that 9 out of 10 UK charities would like to generate more funding from entreprenurial activities. Business is seen as generating a more reliable income than voluntary giving and grant funding would become more difficult to secure in the future.

This has amazing implications given the commercialization and commodification of charity. What changes in the social fabric are created when charities move from voluntary giving to business models built mostly on trade? Is the money spent on the trade (by the consumer) still tax deductible? Do we want nation-states subsidizing large scale charitable trade?

05/28/2013

Interesting report from New Zealand concerning Family First, an organization appealing its loss of status as a charity under the 2005 Charities Act. Family First, is a conservative organization which promotes traditional views of opposite-sex marriage. Bob McCoskrie, the national director of Family First, argued that the given the timining and political climate, and de-registration of his organization in the same week as the re-registration of the National Council on Women provided evidence that the NZ Charities Registration Board was acting politically and abusing its authority.

However, this debate led me to think of a larger question--what if public sentiment and opinion changes drastically where the public no longer supports a once popular view. Could a charity whose goals were perfectly acceptable in one time period be frustrated (and barred) because of changing times?

I am always fascinated with discussions about the counterintuitive results of charity. This op-ed in the Arab News has a simple discussion distinguishing charity from philanthropy and the prominence of charitable organizations in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

02/11/2013

The international charity ActionAid has documented that Zambia Sugar has paid virtually no taxes in Zambia since 2007, despite making over $100 million. Zambia Sugar is a part of Ilovo, the African sugar subsidiary of Associated British Foods. ActionAid highlights that when corporations don't contribute to local economies--especially in Zambia, one of the worlds poorest countries--it exascerbates poverty.

Here is an article about the celebrity gift tent at the 2013 Grammy's. What is fascinating is how it exemplifies the power of gift giving. All of the gifts are given to celebrities in hopes that they will publicize and bring awareness to some product. However, not all of the gifts are solely to promote for-profit enterprises like R&B songstress Chaka Khan's new chocolate line. At least one of the gifts was in promotion of a business paired with the Starkey Hearing Foundation. Though there are arguments to be made that this charitable consumptive capitalism is ultimately in support of for-profit enterprises.

12/19/2012

The following is a fun story about the protocol and social norms behind giving flowers on stage to the ballet dancers of the UK's Royal Ballet. No ballerina can receive flowers on stage if the principal dancer is not given a bouqet first. Luckily, a fund was established to purchase flowers in order to avoid this problem. Male dancers are not allowed to recieve flowers unless they've danced female roles.